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Summer 2015

Directing and Choreography in the Academy and the Profession: a Forum

Anne Fliotsos

Ann M. Shanahan [email protected]

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Recommended Citation Fliotsos, Anne and Shanahan, Ann M., "Directing and Choreography in the Academy and the Profession: a Forum" (2015). Department of Fine & Performing Arts: Faculty Publications and Other Works. 8. https://ecommons.luc.edu/dfpa/8

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. © SDC, 2015. SDC JOURNAL PEER-REVIEWED SECTION directors to enter the profession? What professional realities need to be better considered in our academic training in these DIRECTING AND CHOREOGRAPHY IN THE fields? In addition to training, how can the academy serve the profession? What ACADEMY AND THE PROFESSION: A FORUM problems can be addressed to generate a greater flow between the academy and INTRODUCED + EDITED BY ANNE FLIOTSOS + ANN M. SHANAHAN professional work? How can the academy advance the profession—by offering opportunities to experiment with new production models or serving as incubator n this issue of SDC Journal, SDC is proud to introduce a new peer-reviewed section, featuring for creative work? What exchanges have I academic articles and book reviews on the crafts of directing and choreography. With editorial been successful between the two arenas, support by directors, choreographers, and scholars representing the range of institutions of and where might we go from here? higher education across the country, SDC Journal will publish one academic essay and one book review per issue. The responses from six of our members are included below, followed by a call for The SDC Journal Peer-Reviewed Section is co-edited by Anne Fliotsos, PhD, Professor of Theatre, submissions. We hope this discussion will prompt ideas for future pieces authored by Purdue University, and Ann M. Shanahan, MFA, Associate Professor of Theatre, Loyola University the several directors and choreographers Chicago, with an editorial board comprised of directors, scholars, and choreographers from who occupy this space of rich cross- around the country, several of whom are Members of SDC. Based on Membership surveys in over between training, scholarship, and 2013-14, SDC identified that over one third of its Members are working as teachers and/or artists creative work. Submissions are now being in institutions of higher education. Executive Board Member and professor Sharon Ott and accepted on a rolling basis for the 2016 Executive Director Laura Penn approached Shanahan and her colleagues in the directing cohort of issues. We invite you to participate. a national organization for theatre professors, to explore ways of supporting the unique needs of these directors and choreographers working professionally and in academia. Several of Shanahan’s colleagues had been interested in creating a directing-focused, peer-reviewed publication in order ANNE BOGART to provide additional publication opportunities for directors, deepen conversations about the THE RECIPROCAL LINK craft, and strengthen the connection between training and the profession. Since SDC was also BETWEEN ARTISTIC AND seeking ways to support its Members working in academia, this synergy seemed like a natural SCHOLARLY WORK moment for collaboration.This peer-reviewed section of SDC Journal was one result, along with specified initiatives to support guest artists and observerships for academically situated directors and choreographers. n acting student at Columbia University A once mentioned that her father, a surgeon, had a saying: “Study one, do one, In addition to the co-editors, members of the the Peer-Review Board include book review editor teach one.” I instantly recognized that this Travis Malone, PhD, Associate Professor and Chair of Theatre, Virginia Wesleyan College; and formula, familiar to surgeons, “study one, do associate book review editor Kathleen M. McGeever, MFA, Professor of Performance and one, teach one,” is precisely the right equation Chair, Northern Arizona State University. The Senior Advisory Board includes: Anne Bogart, for me as well. The ratio that allows me to MA, Professor and Head of the Directing Concentration, Columbia University; Joan Herrington, be the best possible theatre artist is: 1/3 PhD, Professor and Chair of Theatre, Western Michigan University; and James Peck, MFA, research, 1/3 directing, and 1/3 teaching. PhD, Professor of Directing, Muhlenberg College. Peer-Reviewers include: Donald Byrd, Choreographer; David Callaghan, MFA, PhD, Professor and Chair of Theatre, University of If I do not dedicate enough time to research Montevallo; Kathryn Ervin, MFA, Professor and Chair of Theatre Arts, California State University or if I teach too much or too little, my work as San Bernardino; Liza Gennaro, MA, Assistant Professor, Musical Theatre, Choreographer, a director, as an artist, is compromised. The Indiana University; Ruth Pe Palileo, PhD, Current Theatrics, Centre for Immigrant Resources correct balance among the three activities is key. This ratio/equation is also crucial and Community Arts (CIRCA), Chicago Pintig Theatre Group; Stephen A. Schrum, PhD, Associate to the effectiveness of SITI Company. One Professor of Theatre Arts, University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg; Scot Reese, MFA, Professor third of our engagement is research and of Performance, University of Maryland; and assistant editors Thomas Costello, PhD, Instructor cultural exchange, 1/3 is spent making and of Speech and Theatre, SUNY Dutchess, and Emily Rollie, PhD, Assistant Professor of Theatre, performing new work, and 1/3 is engaged Monmouth College. in teaching. This equilibrium is central to our well-being, productiveness and usefulness.

Research, or study, for me, includes reading, In order to introduce our new SDC Journal Peer-Reviewed Section (SDCJ-PRS), for our first issue writing, reflection, analysis, and unconscious we created a forum to provoke thoughtful discussion concerning the relationship between the rumination. A successful process is both academy and the profession. We invited members of the SDCJ-PRS Review and Advisory Boards active and passive. After a certain amount to reflect upon any or all of the issues below in short essays. We hope this forum will extend the of committed study, when the unconscious lively discussions that initiated this venture to SDC Journal’s broader readership. We asked: is sufficiently primed, the imagination must be left to do the necessary associative work. How does scholarly work inform or inspire professional creative work? What is the most The composer, conductor, and polymath fruitful relationship between our institutions of higher learning (colleges and universities) and Leonard Bernstein suggested that it would the professions of theatre directing and choreography? How does academic training prepare be technically possible for him to compose a short sonata within a few hours through sheer

38 SDC JOURNAL PEER-REVIEWED SECTION | SUMMER 2015 willpower, but the sonata would not be good. In order for the work to have substance, he Finally, the give-and-take between artistic and But there are inherent challenges. These said, it needs to pass through what he called scholarly work extends to the period following partnerships are expensive. Each time we a trance-like state of unconscious processing. the première of any new production. After the embarked on such a project, the need to raise “It cannot come from the made-up, thinking many crises of rehearsal, after the obstacles funds became our first hurdle. Indeed, such intellectualized, censoring, controlled part and inherent challenges of bringing a new partnerships often open up avenues of funding of my brain.” I did not study directing in project to fruition, there is the opportunity that might not otherwise be available—both graduate school; rather, in 1975 I entered to ruminate, analyse and ultimately share through the prestige of the professional into a then two-year academic Master of new, hard-won insights with others. This partnerships themselves and through the Arts program at New York University, now sharing can transpire via writing, conversation, community engagement that such partnerships known as Performance Studies. Performance practical workshops, or teaching. Thus, now can create. Additionally, the visibility that studies continue to impact my work in full circle, the reciprocal link between scholarly accompanies hosting these artists on campus meaningful ways. Every time I approach a new and artistic work can begin all over again. can attract funding from foundations with production I pose the questions that I was related missions, who welcome the exposure. encouraged to ask at NYU: What is a play? Anne Bogart is a prolific and award-winning How does a play function in society? What American theatre and opera director. She is the These partnerships require long-term planning. is acting? What is performance? What does Co-Artistic Director of SITI Company, which she Established professional companies often it mean to the world to act or to perform? founded with Japanese director Tadashi Suzuki have full schedules and a theatre department What is a rehearsal? What is an audience? in 1992, and a Professor at Columbia University must be able to accommodate a limited These questions are anthropological and where she runs the Graduate Directing window of availability—and be prepared to sociological. Performance studies initiated an Program. She is the author of five books: A be “bumped” when the Goodman or the appetite for theoretical inquiry that continues Director Prepares, The Viewpoints Book, And Public Theatre makes a competing offer. to this day to affect all my waking hours. Then, You Act, Conversations with Anne, and, most recently, What’s the Story. There must also be a fundamental willingness Teaching is also a key component to my on the part of the faculty to embrace a work as a theatre director. If the arts were methodology that may be far from the daily subsidized in the United States as they are in JOAN HERRINGTON life of the unit. This multi-faceted willingness many European nations, I would probably not TRAINING THROUGH ranges from the welcoming of super-star need to teach as much as I do. The extended PROFESSIONAL artists to campus, to the ability to work in rehearsal periods enjoyed in Russia, Germany, potentially new ways, from casting to technical PARTNERSHIPS AND France, and the Scandanavian countries production. And most importantly, for such GUEST ARTISTS afford artists the deep exploration of subject partnerships to have lasting benefit, they matter that any serious theatrical endeavor require a willingness to engage with the work ith the hallowed halls of regional demands. In these countries the development long after the guest artists have departed. theatres becoming fewer in number, of training, the shared research, and the W Each of the experiences has brought to us a the traditional model of conservatory style essential experimentation can be carried new vocabulary, along with the challenges of training—the mainstay of the majority of out within the context of rehearsal. In the using that vocabulary. They have also brought theatre programs within the academy—is United States, most of my work in developing to the visiting artists new perspectives on their necessarily challenged. Thus, we must ask technique and in investigating content occurs, own work inspired by the generation that ourselves if we are teaching to and modeling alternatively, within the classroom. I study will follow them into the theatre. As Tectonic for students our past, or their future. While alongside my students at Columbia University company member Kelli Simpkins noted: we must take care not to jettison the basic and in the context of classes at SITI. The training of theatre artists that is crucial SITI Company actors also work to advance There are numerous benefits of partnering regardless of the expanse of the form, we their personal and shared understanding of a professional company with an academic also must acknowledge that exposing our technique and form through their teaching at institution. When I came to Western students to a broad array of theatre-making SITI and worldwide at academic and artistic Michigan University to introduce students techniques is crucial to both their survival as institutions. The standard three to four-week to Tectonic Theater Project’s technique of artists and to the survival of the theatre itself. rehearal schedule that is the norm in the “moment work” and to subsequently cast United States demands that everyone must them in a company created project, I had While theatre professors often have the hit the tarmac running at top speed in order no clear idea what the benefits would be. ability to bring to their students a range to stage the given play with courage and But finding my voice as a leader changed of theatre experiences, the opportunity to alacrity within the given amount of time. But me. The benefits included not only my immerse college students in the work of where and when does the crucial preparation own personal evolution, but learning from professional companies offers extraordinary happen? It can happen in the classroom. these students who quickly became my opportunity—and often, significant challenges. collaborators and teachers. Working with The university environment provides an the best that the department has to offer, Over the past decade, my theatre department alternative to the lack of arts subsidy in working with students who are being has chosen to pursue such engagement, the United States. The collegiality of fellow mentored by faculty, who are living fully working with, for example, the SITI Company academics, the enthusiasm of young artists in their training and yearning to put their and The Tectonic Theater Project. We heading into the field, and a quiet campus incredible skills to use with an outsider, gave are currently working with Universes, re- environment can offer a respite from the me new insights into this technique that envisioning their well-known theatre piece, relatively cutthroat commercial and not-for- I’d almost taken for granted. And it made Ameriville. In relaying these experiences— profit world. But there must be a lively and me feel alive in the present moment in a which both grew and frustrated students and mutually beneficial interchange between way that the best theatre creation can do. faculty alike, I advocate for such engagement. the profession and the academy, otherwise the relationship will be perfunctory.

SUMMER 2015 | SDC JOURNAL PEER-REVIEWED SECTION 39 Another fundamental challenge of devising an ever-changing script that threatened our While Universes will be in residence for eight new work with professional partners is the abilty to finalize designs in sufficient time for weeks, the preliminary casting and design work time required to complete the endeavor. the shops to have comfort in their realization; required everyone on the team to limit face-to Recognizing the extraordinary potential frictions for technical personnel with unfamiliar face time and to work more remotely—an of Viewpoints training as preparation for methodologies; and a fluidity of “product” right approach out of our traditional process. And devising, two faculty members envisioned through opening. But these are all challenges again, the rules of collaboration need to be a project wherein the SITI Company was worth facing, provided that everyone in continually re-examined. Ameriville has been brought in to teach student actors who would the exchange believes in the value of the successfully produced by Universes many later create an original work. Engagement engagement; with friction comes heat and times—and has been done largely the same spread over seven months; training on creativity—a fundamental requirement for such way. If the project was to have value for our campus was followed by continued practice professional partnerships. Simpkins noted: students, we asked that the cast of four expand and further training off campus by the to at least eight (they chose to expand it to student company. Then devising began. [A real] challenge was being the new kid fourteen) and that the production itself be re- on the university block. Yes, I came vetted envisioned so that our design students could The wealth of time had tremendous benefit, as because of the previous work that I’d engage with our guests. As we have moved it allowed the work to have real presence in the done with Tectonic and that reputation forward on this project, we have the great joy department for an extended period, such that is hugely important, but I didn’t know that comes from watching our students stand it began to positively infect many students not these students, nor did I know the faculty. with our guests on unfamiliar aesthetic ground, directly involved in the work. The production Everyone gave their all to this piece and and in turn our artists be newly inspired by the de- and re-constructed the text Women of Troy fought to make it the absolute best it could ideas of their student collaborators. Universes to include firsthand accounts of those who had be. But there were struggles because I was company member Steven Sapp noted: experienced genocide in the second half of new to them and they were new to me. this century. The impact of the SITI training was I feel like these types of partnerships are clear: this new work startled both the campus Having shared all of the benefits and beneficial for Universes because they give and local community with its exceptional challenges, I would say that this experience us an opportunity to look at the work ensemble work, its unique staging, and its was truly one of the most difficult and through young and hungry artists who are ability to bring to a classic play frightening the most rewarding of my career. Taking excited about getting a chance to work on relevance. While none of my faculty professes time away from professional theatre to material with a professional company. It is a an ability to prepare students to work in the work in this university model made me chance to teach our aesthetic in a rehearsal, methods of the SITI Company, their return a much better artist and collaborator. performance environment, which is much visits and the investment of performance And working with students who yearn more in depth than just a brief workshop faculty over time have enabled this work to to have complex experiences in which exchange. It also introduces the students to live in our classrooms and to change the face they feel ownership and responsibility new contemporary work, that is becoming of how we think about theatre long term. enlivened my career and my techniques part of the American theatre canon. and gave me new skills and inspirations. Good Death is a devised work created by His thoughts are echoed by Simpkins who our students working in collaboration with Both Women of Troy and Good Death were believes: “There is a benefit to being the only two artists from Tectonic Theater Project, not only produced on campus but also went 'expert', but also a benefit in being open to Simpkins and Leigh Fondakowski. It focused to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Electrified learning the expertness and the openness of on the question of the right to die and was by new levels of engagement for artists and amazingly committed theatre students and heavily drawn from the lives of people in audiences alike, we felt compelled to extend how much they yearn to absorb and explore." our community and our state. The primary the life of these projects—to both embed challenge was, again, the necessary duration them more deeply at home and to share One additional challenge that sometimes of the project—how to accommodate a more broadly with the larger artistic world applies is the working model for collaborative period of preliminary engagement to launch the lasting value from these partnerships. ensembles that operate without a singular the work, an expansive period of research, director. Even in companies such as SITI or and enough time to create the piece in Several years ago, I approached Steven Sapp Tectonic with an identified “director,” the a collaborative model. This was achieved of Universes to ask if he would be interested in relationship between that person and her through three separate residencies—two collaborating with us on a production. It took actors—or the relationship between that short and one seven weeks—for the artists us four years to find the finances to support person and his designers—is often very on campus, singly and together. Still, the venture, along with a timeframe when different than those relationships in the director Simpkins clearly felt pressured: Universes was available to be in residence. academy, where we tend to work in a more traditional pyramidal structure, the director In terms of challenges: time was certainly We originally spoke of devising a new piece sitting clearly on the upper most point. While one of the biggest. Usually these projects but given the constraints of scheduling, we we have embraced a more egalitarian structure can take years to come to fruition. Creating decided instead to work with an established on many occasions, my tremendously open- a play from raw material and interviews in company piece—Ameriville—and to “adapt” minded technical director still felt compelled six weeks was something I’d never done the script, adding material that made it to ask our guest from Universes—known before and it was a pressure that created relevant to our community. We had learned for its collaborative ensemble building much angst. In the end, the deadline focused through our experiences with Tectonic of all work—if one of them would be the the play but I wish we’d had more time. the tremendous rewards that come from “director” on our project together. We found such engagement. Bridging the town/ a good compromise in this case: Steve Sapp Producing Good Death presented for faculty gown divide quite obviously changes the will lead the work in rehearsal, and when and staff the difficulty of working with relationship between artist and audience he steps back onto the stage, a faculty professional artists whose process is very in an extraordinary way—and it is also member will lead the show through tech. different. Chief among the challenges were: attractive to both foundations and donors.

40 SDC JOURNAL PEER-REVIEWED SECTION | SUMMER 2015 It is an excellent blending of methodologies teaming with under-resourced companies to and large, the academy as a site of knowledge and a great learning experience for us all. develop new projects. It may mean finding production is nervous about the body and ways to share space, personnel, and budget overtly hostile to feeling. Binary oppositions These partnerships energize our community. in mutually beneficial ways. Many such such as Mind vs. Body, Thought vs. Emotion, They open to our students and faculty new collaborations already exist, and though it’s Objective vs. Subjective, and Analysis vs. pathways for creating theatre. In many ways, often tricky and occasionally uncomfortable Creativity abound in the academy, with the it would be much simpler to continue to to work out the details, they can be worked latter terms always subordinate to the former. do the work that we know best and with out. I hope this section of SDC Journal will These arrangements of knowledge are at which we are so comfortable. But how in part provide a space to share examples of best limiting, at worst harmful, and whatever then would we all continue to grow? how such arrangements can and do work. their ultimate effects, false. As an embodied, affecting, intellectually and socially complex Joan Herrington is Chair of the Department However, in answering the question “How art form, theatre is not well served by such of Theatre at Western Michigan University. can the academy serve the profession?” it’s attitudes. Neither, in my view, are people. I She is a contemporary theatre scholar whose vital to recognize that “the academy” is not want good artists to work at my institution not research is focused on the pedagogy and monolithic, nor is “the profession.” Every only for the professional savvy to which they practice of theatre in the last thirty years. academic theatre program needs to think expose my students. I value their experience She is the author of four books and over a hard and always about how its work, including and am delighted when they share it. But in dozen book chapters and journal articles that the guests it employs and the partnerships the end I’m much more compelled by the examine the creative process of playwrights it forges, aligns with the mission of the ways they expand what counts as complex, and directors. The subject of her research has college or university to which it contributes. persuasive knowledge. Artists make sensate ranged from the work of August Wilson to the I have taught for the last fifteen years at an forms speak. Theatre artists demonstrate that complex practice of the SITI Company. undergraduate liberal arts college with a profound social, psychological, and ethical large and thriving theatre program. I teach insight arises in the concreteness of human directing, among other things, and for eight doing. Directorial intelligence asserts itself in JAMES PECK years chaired my department. And though the rhythm of a downstage cross, the cut of a HOW MIGHT THE I value the accomplishment and sustained hemline, the timbre of a voice, the angle of a ACADEMY SERVE commitment the word “professional” connotes, gesture, the count of a light cue, and on and I do not think it my principal task to prepare on. The arts trust in the specific eloquence of THE PROFESSION? young artists to enter the “the profession.” I the material world in ways that rub against the AND VICE VERSA do try to equip students who hope for a life in tendency of most academic disciplines toward the theatre with a sophisticated repertoire of disembodied abstraction and generalization. his new section of SDC Journal aims to knowledge and practices to draw upon when I’m happy to be working at a liberal arts address productive exchanges, actual T they walk into a rehearsal hall or production college that insists its arts majors grapple with or imagined, between professional theatre meeting. But teaching in the context of the science, social science, and the interpretive and theatre in colleges and universities. liberal arts, I have a prior commitment to humanities. Artists need to take seriously the This inaugural group of essays, the editors provide them with opportunities and tools rigor, skepticism, and fierce intelligence of suggested, might range across issues of to mature into thoughtful, empathetic adults those disciplines. But the world of knowledge training, the professionalization of young with a complex sense of the world, their also needs the fierce intelligence of artistic directors, or collaboration on production. Since place in it, and their responsibilities to it. For assertion. And providing more of that is how I a significant percentage of the Membership me, doing this is much more important than hope the profession can serve the academy. of SDC works in higher education, myself training people for jobs that barely exist. included, these pages are a promising place It’s also much more interesting. In some I imagine it’s clear that I think an to explore such questions. One of the prompts twenty-three years of college teaching, I have undergraduate theatre degree shouldn’t be offered by the editors asked: “In addition found that directing classes, happily, provide valued solely (or even primarily) for preparing to training, how can the academy serve the a capacious space for people to develop students to succeed in the profession. profession?” This is an important issue, and aptitudes, sensibilities, and skills that enable The terms “succeed” and “profession” are one that I’ll briefly address. But writing from them to shape themselves and their world so malleable and contingent anyway that my particular experience as an SDC Member in serious, effective, and big-hearted ways. ultimately everyone needs to define and and a tenured professor recently named an redefine them for him or herself over the associate dean at a liberal arts college, I feel And here I want to ask the inverse question: course of a lifetime. That said, many of my it most urgent to also reverse the direction of “How can the profession serve the academy?” students do go on to get paid for their work that inquiry. I want to ask, in addition, “How The narrowest answers might emphasize the as artists, a few of them as directors. I think can the profession serve the academy?” networks that emerge when artists primarily that’s great. Many find or create positions as located in the professional arena work on arts administrators or arts educators, and I “How can the academy serve the profession?” college campuses. I’m of course grateful to also think that’s great. And many more build Both theatre companies and the Arts and the many artists who have circulated through professional lives outside the arts but become Humanities divisions of college campuses are our program and subsequently opened doors devoted audience members. And that’s great in the midst of rapid, undesired retrenchment. for my students. (If that’s you, and it might too. A few graduates leave the theatre entirely Budgets are being slashed and positions be, thank you.) But that’s a constrained and behind. That saddens me, but to my surprise eliminated. In such a moment of financial utilitarian notion of what accomplished artists I’m okay with it. I have to believe that people precarity, figuring out ways to link the bring to an academic context. I’d prefer instead equipped with the habits of mind, feeling, resources of the academy to the professional to trumpet the kinds of knowledge that artists and action fostered by seriously studying theatre is a good idea. It may mean creating make uniquely possible. What can students the theatre for four years, whether or not conditions in which established theatre artists know through study of the arts that they can’t they choose it for their profession or even can make work and make a living, whether as know in other ways? I would argue that by keep it firmly in their lives, are apt to make long-term faculty or guest artists. It may mean

SUMMER 2015 | SDC JOURNAL PEER-REVIEWED SECTION 41 the world more humane. And I am ultimately to find answers in her own individual KATHLEEN M. less concerned that the theatre retain manner by examining a variety of sources, MCGEEVER patrons than I am that humanity awaken. including historical accounts (biography, FUNDING AND autobiography, newspapers, magazines, PARTNERSHIPS IN James Peck is Professor of Theatre and literature, oral history), art (paintings, PUBLIC Associate Dean for Diversity Initiatives at architecture, fashion),film (documentary, INSTITUTIONS Muhlenberg College. He has directed over biographical, entertainment), and music sixty productions of plays, musicals, and (recordings, scores). Scholarly writing offers niversities are historically institutions operas in professional and university settings. additional perspectives to the creative of innovation and discovery. The He has published numerous scholarly articles process by employing insights developed U environment has been one in which theatre and book chapters and is a former editor through rigorous academic standards. artists can experiment without exclusive of the journal Theatre Topics. In addition focus on profit or bottom line, and this to Muhlenberg, he has taught at New York In my own experience I have found Jean and experimentation can spark interesting new University, the Playwrights Horizons Theatre Marshall Stearns' book, Jazz Dance and Lynne directions—both for the present, and the School, and the Yale School of Drama. He is a Fauley Emery’s Black Dance: From 1619 to future through training the next generation. Member of SDC. Today invaluable sources for understanding While, sadly, financial support for higher and examining African American vernacular education is fading with trends to cut funding dance; Nancy Lee Chalfa Ruyter’s The regionally and nationally, from my vantage Cultivation of Body and Mind in Nineteenth- LIZA GENNARO point as chair of Theatre in a large public Century American Delsartism is essential SCHOLARLY WORK institution, I still believe the academy can be to understanding movement vocabularies AS INSPIRATION fertile ground for directorial innovation. associated with the late nineteenth and early FOR PROFESSIONAL twentieth centuries; Barbara Stratyner’s, CREATIVE WORK The academy is a place to dream, explore, Ned Wayburn and the Dance Routine: From and stretch in ways one might not be able Vaudeville to the Ziegfeld Follies, is important ne of the many advantages of being beyond its walls. Universities are a place to to understanding the Revue Era and precision raised in a family of theatre artists risk; production aesthetics can be explored O line dance and Ballroom, Boogie, Shimmy is having access to an extensive library of fully. While those of us who work in higher Sham, Shake: A Social and Popular Dance art-related books. Some of my strongest education might complain that a “short” 6 to Reader, edited by Julie Malnig, offers a childhood memories are of countless 8 week process is not enough to explore and thorough understanding of social dance trends hours spent in my father’s study reading reflect as we would desire, still it is significantly in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. volumes of dance, theatre, art, and fashion. more time than the typical professional These books were tools of my father’s, rehearsal process in this country. Doubling These examples relate directly to projects I choreographer Peter Gennaro’s, trade. rehearsal time means more exploration, have choreographed; however my research and Passages were underlined and sometimes which can foster increased discovery and inquiry, like those of my theatre colleagues, I would find drawings that he had made innovation. Working in the academy can foster is not limited to specific projects. Keeping to illustrate a text. My favorite, I still have development of new directing methods, and up with the prolific output of scholars is it, is a sketch of Bill “Bojangles” Robinson’s the opportunity to identify and grow new an exciting endeavor. Liz Wollman’s, Hard dancing shoe – a very specific design with a talent. My personal directing style, developed Times: The Adult Musical in 1970’s New York wooden sole, particular to Robinson. Being by combining and adapting various techniques and Carol Oja’s Bernstein Meets Broadway: surrounded by those books and now books to meet the ever-changing needs of the young Collaborative Art in a Time of War are both of my own was then, and continues to be, a actors in my undergraduate institution, has inspiring and fascinating additions to my constant source of intellectual fascination, served me well, both in the academic context ever growing library. No creative artist visual stimulation, and inspiration. and professionally. Many major directors that I have ever met lives in an isolated and choreographers have found a home in bubble. We are influenced and inspired by Jerome Robbins and Agnes de Mille, the both worlds, including Anne Bogart, Sharon the world around us and scholarly work ostensible parents of contemporary musical Ott, Mark Lamos, and Susan H. Schulman, stimulates and enhances our creative ideas. theatre choreography were both avid to name a few. One of the most important researchers. De Mille not only employed things we do as teachers is light a spark in Liza Gennaro has choreographed extensively her extensive knowledge of dance to her a student who had not considered directing on Broadway, Off-Broadway, and in Regional musical theatre choreography, she also wrote or choreography, but has aptitude there. If it theatres. She is a Member of the SDC Executive several dance history books and a biography hadn’t been for Dr. Kjell Amble (who in the Board and in 2015 completed a three- of Martha Graham. Robbins’ archives at the stereotype of the directing professor came year term on the Tony Award Nominating New York Public Library for the Performing to class everyday in his rumbled tweed jacket Committee. Her chapter, “Evolution of Dance Arts contain extensive files of research with patches on the elbows, smoking a pipe) I in the Golden Era of the American ‘Book material for each of his shows, including am not sure I would have taken the director’s Musical,’” appears in The Oxford Handbook books and essays on Cambodian Dance path. Dr. Amble encouraged and inspired me of the American Musical and a new chapter, (The King and I, 1951), articles and “How To” to explore directing because he saw something co-written with Stacy Wolf, “Dance in Musical manuals for preparing to learn the Tango in me I did not know was there, and that he Theatre” appears in the upcoming Oxford (High Button Shoes, 1947), and articles, essays, helped nurture. Later, as a directing student, Handbook of Dance and Theater. She is handbooks, and photographs demonstrating I remember learning from choreographer currently on faculty at Indiana University the Charleston (Billion Dollar Baby, 1945). Donald McKayle, who was an advocate of in the Department of Theatre, Drama and Laban work. The opportunity was provided Contemporary Dance. Discovering how and why people dance is by The California Arts Project (TCAP), funded an essential element of the musical theatre through the Board of Education. I immediately choreographer’s task and each proceeds found the work valuable to the development

42 SDC JOURNAL PEER-REVIEWED SECTION | SUMMER 2015 of my directing style; the cross-pollination of performed, embodied behaviours, what the Luther Luckett Correctional Complex in of dancer and director, professional and would we know that we do not know now? Kentucky. In turn, Baz Kershaw, an academic at student, and the environment of trial and Whose stories, memories and struggles might the University of Lancaster who also directed error coupled with adequate time, created a become visible?”(xviii). To use a scholarly lens at Lancaster Farms for young offenders, cites vibrant and creative working relationship. on professional directing and choreography the influence of scholars Michel Foucault projects is to illuminate the stories, memories and Slavoj Zizek on his directing work. Professional/educational partnerships such as and struggles involved in these projects. Too Thus William Shakespeare’s archive informs TCAP have a long history within the academy, often, the hard-won lessons a professional the repertoire of Trounstine and Tofteland, and are an excellent way in which directors director/choreographer gleans from a given whose work then becomes the archive that and choreographers can work together project are as ephemeral as the project itself; informs the repertoire of scholars Balfour to inspire one another, and develop new the show closes, and the stories unique to and Kershaw, which relies on the archive ways of creating. In the changing economic the project are gone. And though there of scholars Foucault and Zizek, and so on landscape we must find new ways to create may be records—or as Taylor defines it, the around the world, transforming the isolation these partnerships. In the past these have “archive” of the work—such as an occasional of directing in prison to a lively dialogue. been more common for private institutions, recording, review, or blog, these records do which have more abundant donor dollars at not constitute what Taylor calls the “repertoire” This circular exchange between scholarly their disposal. One possible model for both of the work, that “vital act” of dialogue work and creative work can also often be public and private institutions is a brand between the work and its audience in which found in the relationship between dramaturg of "public/private partnership," or PPPs (as “social knowledge, memory and a sense of and director/choreographer—such as the they are called in a business context). PPPs identity” are transmitted (2). When a scholar relationship of Heidi Gilpin and choreographer have been featured in press surrounding revisits the work, however, the project can be William Forsythe. Gilpin worked as an editor the state of public institutions of higher reoriented and revitalized because the scholar for Copyright and Parallax, a journal of education since the 2008 recession. Rising again engages the work in dialogue—placing cultural criticism, which Forsythe read. He stresses in the university, including higher the work in discussion with a different social initiated “endless conversations” with Gilpin demands for student success and career knowledge, memory, or sense of identity. that eventually resulted in her working as readiness, along with shrinking funding, have The “archive” of the closed project is thus a dramaturg with Forsythe from 1989 to prompted increased consideration of PPPs. I reinvigorated as “repertoire”—engaging 1996. This in turn, led to further essays am not arguing for using these partnerships in a second vital incarnation with a second by Gilpin about Forsythe’s work. Again, as a quick fix, cure-all for higher education's audience, those who read the scholarly work. “archive” initiates dialogue with “repertoire” budget woes, but rather as opportunity to which leads to “endless conversation” foster deeper artistic collaborations that Thus, directors/choreographers who have between the two. Examples such as these forge a path, not only for a new generation academic training are given the skills to 1) illustrate the types of successful exchanges of artists, but for new audiences as well. This record or document their own “archive” and between academia and creative work. change in funding can be looked at as a rich 2) engage their own work and the work of opportunity, through which the educational others as “repertoire.” Academic training for “Endless conversations” do take time to build, and professional worlds of theatre might find “scholarly directors” allows them to inform however; this is one of the difficulties in new, meaningful, and lasting opportunities to their creativity with research and to re-engage moving from archive to repertoire and back collaborate. When considered in this light, the professional work with an academic lens. Such again for the scholarly director/choreographer. possibilities for continued innovation are many. scholarly directors also learn how to complete Often, the professional timeline of preparing their work within strict deadlines and how a show within a month or two leaves little In her 30-year career, Kathleen M. McGeever to review and refine the work so that it is time for the studied, measured research and has worked professionally as director, actor, better viewed within well-defined parameters. reflection which make the strongest academic educator, arts administrator, dramaturge, These skills serve the professions of directing/ work; the two types of work happen at and playwright. She has directed over choreography and, in return, academia different speeds. Moreover, the professional 50 plays in a variety of genres, from new provides scholarly directors a wider network reality is that when one is working to complete plays, to Commedia dell’ Arte, absurdist, to inform their work and a wider audience a project for the “archive,” it is difficult to classical, and puppetry. McGeever is an to engage in dialogue with their work. keep open the idea of a future “repertoire” Associate Member of SDC, and has served engagement; most director/choreographers as Chair of the Northern Arizona University Take for example, scholarly directors studying are more focused on their audience, the Department of Theatre since 2007. the works of Shakespeare as used in prisons. “repertoire” of the present. The “archive” A director in such an environment must keep priority is to create and complete the work RUTH PE PALILEO the archival work confidential to some extent while the “repertoire” priority is to receive THE SCHOLARLY because it is potentially dangerous. Because and analyse the work; the two types of work DIRECTOR/ of this, directors working in this field feel an happen with different priorities. Therefore, CHOREOGRAPHER: inherent isolation. The scholarly response resources which support a scholarly director/ for alleviating such isolation includes Michel choreographer in moving between the two VISITING THE ARCHIVE Balfour’s work Theatre in Prison: Theory and stages would create a greater flow between TO REVITALIZE THE Practice and a conference at University of the academic and professional work. What REPERTOIRE Notre Dame in 2013. Of course, academic if there were retreats made available to a research into “Shakespeare behind bars”1 director/choreographer upon completion of an n her book The Archive and the Repertoire: would not be possible without the archive interesting project so that she would have time I Performing Cultural Memory in the of Shakespeare Behind Bars, the title of Jean to record and reflect upon her process? What if Americas, Diana Taylor asks, “If…we were to Trounstine’s writings about her directing there were assistant directors/choreographers reorient the ways social memory and cultural project at a women’s correctional facility whose particular purpose was to annotate identity in the Americas have traditionally in Massachusetts and of a documentary the production in a scholarly manner? What been studied…and look through the lens about the work of director Curt Tofteland at if a scholar were able to fund a directing or

SUMMER 2015 | SDC JOURNAL PEER-REVIEWED SECTION 43 choreography project by researching and WORKS CITED CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS preparing an academic “proposal” first? This Egri, Lajos. The Art of Dramatic Writing. New Published quarterly by Stage Directors and model from the sciences, in which a grant York: Simon and Schuster, 2004. Print. Choreographers Society (SDC), this new proposal lays out the hypothesis and describes peer-reviewed section of SDC Journal serves the methodology for testing it has much to Emery, Lynne Fauley. Black Dance: directors and choreographers working in offer the scholarly director/choreographer. From 1619 to Today. Princeton: the profession and in institutions of higher Such early academic research and preparation Princeton Book, 1989. Print. learning. SDC’s mission is to give voice to into the hypothesis of a professional project, an empowered collective of directors and into discovering the critical artistic question Kershaw, Baz. “Pathologies of Hope in choreographers working in all jurisdictions that a given project asks2 will certainly Drama and Theatre.” Theatre in Prison: and venues across the country, encourage clarify her vision of the professional work. Theory and Practice. Ed. Michel Balfour. advocacy, and highlight artistic achievement. Portland: Intellect, 2004. 35-53. Print. Ruth Pe Palileo is a director/producer for SDC Journal seeks essays with accessible Lebovits, Susan Chaityn. “Shakespeare Goes Current Theatrics in Las Vegas and a director/ language that focus on practice and practical behind Prison Bars.” Boston Globe. playwright for Pintig Cultural Group in application and that exemplify the sorts of 15 July 2007. Web. 13 Apr. 2015. Chicago. In 2014, Ruth adapted and directed fruitful intersections that can occur between the award-winning time travel novel The the academic/scholarly and the profession/ Malnig, Julie, ed. Ballroom, Boogie, Anubis Gates for an audience of 1,300 craft. For more information, visit: Shimmy Sham, Shake: A Social and in London. A documentary about Ruth’s www.sdcweb.org/community/sdc- Popular Dance Reader. Carbondale: site-specific production of The Passion of journal/sdc-journal-peer-review U of Illinois P, 2008. Print. Christ for the Church of Ireland airs yearly on Irish television RTE. Ruth received her Oja, Carol J. Bernstein Meets Broadway: Anne Fliotsos (Co-editor doctorate in Theatre and Performance from Collaborative Art in a Time of War. SDCJ-PRS) In recognition of Trinity College Dublin, Ireland in 2010. Her Oxford: Oxford UP, 2014. Print. her scholarly activity, Fliotsos current production, David Mamet’s A Life has been named a Purdue in the Theatre, is on tour in Phoenix. Ruyter, Nancy Lee Chalfa. Cultivation of University Faculty Scholar for the Body and Mind in Nineteenth- 2013-2018. Her research is ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Century American Delsartism. primarily in theatre pedagogy, Gratitude to Laura Penn, Sharon Ott, Mark Westport: Greenwood, 1999. Print. women directors, and th Duncan, Elizabeth Nelson, Miriam Mills, Lewis 20 -century Broadway Theatre. Edited and Sapp, Steven. Personal interview with authored books include Teaching Theatre Magruder, Scott Shattuck, Lionel Walsh, Mark Joan Herrington. 19 May 2015. Today, American Women Stage Directors of the Lococo, Henry Bial, Patricia Ybarra, Harvey Twentieth Century, and Interpreting the Play Young, Laura MacDonald, Becky Prophet, R. Shakespeare in Prisons 2013 Conference. Script: Contemplation and Analysis, and Michael Gros, and members of the Directing University of Notre Dame, International Women Stage Directors. Program Electronic Journal Task Force. n.d. Web. 13 Apr. 2015. Ann M. Shanahan (Co-editor Simpkins, Kelli. Personal interview with NOTES SDCJ-PRS) is Associate Joan Herrington. 26 May 2015. Professor of Theatre at Loyola 1. “Shakespeare behind bars” appears to University Chicago, and serves be used as a nickname for this particular Stearns, Marshall and Jean Stearns. Jazz Dance: as Graduate Program Director practice of prison drama. It is also The Story of American Vernacular Dance. of Women’s Studies and nd the name of the oldest US program 2 ed. Boston: Da Capo, 1994. Print. Gender Studies. She has directed over 50 productions currently practicing such theatre and of a Stratyner, Barbara. Ned Wayburn and in academic and professional venues. Her documentary about that program. the Dance Routine: From Vaudeville recent scholarship on gender and space in to the Ziegfeld Follies. Madison: directing is published in Theatre Topics, Theatre 2. In his book The Art of Dramatic Writing, U of Wisconsin P, 1996. Print. Journal and Text and Presentation, and a Lajos Egri argues that each dramatic work Taylor, Diana. The Archive and the forthcoming anthology entitled Performing the asks at least a single question of its audience Repertoire: Performing Cultural Family Dream House: Space, Ritual, and Images and that all further engagement with a given Memory in the Americas. Durham: of Home (U of Iowa). Shanahan is an Associate work depends from an understanding of Duke UP Books, 2003. Print. Member of SDC. that critical question. Trencsényi, Katalin. Dramaturgy in the Making: A User’s Guide for Theatre Practitioners. New York: Bloomsbury Methuen Drama, 2015. Print. ANNE BOGART since 1990 | PETER BROOK since 1959 DONALD BYRD since 2005 | DAVID CALLAGHAN Assc. since 2010 THOMAS COSTELLO Assc. since 2011 | AGNES DE MILLE d.1993 Trounstine, Jean. Shakespeare Behind Bars: LEIGH FONDAKOWSKI since 2005 | LIZA GENNARO since 1991 The Power of Drama in a Women’s Prison. PETER GENNARO d.2000 | R. MICHAEL GROS since 2007 New York: St. Martin’s, 2001. Print. MARK LAMOS since 1986 | MARK LOCOCO since 2007 TRAVIS MALONE Assc. since 2015 | DAVID MAMET since 1992 Wollman, Elizabeth L. Hard Times: The SIMON MCBURNEY since 1998 | KATHLEEN M. MCGEEVER Assc. since 2014 DONALD MCKAYLE since 1964 | SHARON OTT since 1980 Adult Musical in 1970’s New York City. RUTH PE PALILEO Assc. since 2013 | JAMES PECK since1997 New York: Oxford UP, 2012. Print. SCOT REESE Assc. since 2006 | JEROME ROBBINS d.1998 EMILY ROLLIE Assc. since 2014 | SUSAN H. SCHULMAN since 1981 PETER SELLARS since 1997 | ANN M. SHANAHAN Assc. since 2014 44 SDC JOURNAL PEER-REVIEWED SECTION | SUMMER 2015 ROBERT WILSON since 1986